


fly me to the moon

by goodboots



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-21
Updated: 2016-04-21
Packaged: 2018-06-03 14:31:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6614317
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodboots/pseuds/goodboots
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Hon. Phryne Fisher, lady detective, is the Doctor's newest travelling companion. Unfortunately for him, she has a few companions of her own; it was only a matter of time before she insisted on retrieving one in particular.</p>
            </blockquote>





	fly me to the moon

The moon hung high in the sky, full and bright, not a cloud to obscure it, and the Melbourne night was still and quiet but for the hum of insects and the distant raving of Mr Henderson, who was insisting that his dairy farm was the site of a recent outer-space invasion.

It made an interesting change from the reliable murders and violent incidents that cropped up regularly, but Inspector Jack Robinson couldn't say he was fond of this assignment. He regarded the twilight scene of farmhouse and barn, truck and shed, not a corpse in sight, and kicked at the packed earth with one booted foot.

"There's nothing here, Collins," he called back over his shoulder.

Constable Collins approached, hesitated; everyone seemed to be hesitating around him lately. It was insufferable.

"With all due respect sir, something spooked those cows awfully, and Mr Henderson insists he saw something very odd in the sky over the dairy."

Jack felt his annoyance showing on his face, and couldn't be bothered to quell it. "Space ships. Do you hear yourself?"

"There are plenty of perfectly logical explanations for an unidentified object in the night sky. A rogue pilot from the RAAF base, or—or a weather balloon—"

"A rogue weather balloon?"

Collins stared him down, then said in an undertone: "We need to handle an actual case, sir. We've not been out on a call in days. It doesn't have to be this one, but if we're going to be expending department resources on a search, we have to account for them somehow."

Jack stared back at him, taken aback by the turn in logic, and faintly impressed.

Even so, he had to take the wind out of that idea. "We're not going to waste valuable time on the ravings of a drunkard. There's nothing here to investigate. And if," he said, preemptive, " _if_ I had another case to investigate, which I do not, I wouldn't try to disguise it. That sort of thinking won't fly in front of a review board."

Collins started a reply, but one of the junior constables, so fresh-faced Jack wondered that he should be allowed out this late at night, appeared from behind the farmhouse and interrupted:

"Sir, we found something. You'll want to see this."

He led them through the field and around the barn, and onto the drive. Jack had to squint to make out the shape the junior constable indicated in the distance; but when he saw it, he frowned.

"Is that—" Collins started.

"—A police box."

Perhaps a kilometre down the lane, perched on the turn-in to the city, was a bright blue police box. Jack hadn't seen one of those since the war, when they were just starting to appear on London's streets. Odd that it should be out here, in the sticks, on a farm road. 

Odder still, Melbourne _had_ no police boxes.

"Collins," Jack started, trundling away from Mr Henderson and the cluster of hatchling Constables and on down the hill, "I'm going to go take a look at this police box, see if it's a prank of some kind. I think you ought to--"

"Please don't say—"

"Stay here, take down witnesses' statements. I'll be right back."

Collins deflated. "—that."

#

It was a longer walk than it looked, ten minutes or so, and the whole while Jack could feel eyes on his back, though when he glanced back he saw the junior Constable scribbling in his notebook while Mr Henderson raved. Probably Collins was planning to sprint down the hill if Jack got out of sight.

Up close, he could confirm that it was in fact a police box, and it looked real enough. The paint was brilliant blue, slightly faded and worn, wooden frame sturdy. The windows seemed a bit too small. 

The door facing up the hill to the Henderson farm was shut. He took a cursory inspection, circling round to the other side of the box, and there found a familiar face.

"Jack!" Miss Fisher exclaimed, lighting up with a delighted smile. She was leaning against the box, staring up at the stars, and gave a jump at the sight of him.

He meant to say "Miss Fisher" in response, really he did, but instead he sort of just sighed "Phryne," instead, and couldn't even blame himself for sounding like a besotted idiot. He was unbearably relieved to see her.

Something inside him relaxed, an internal tension slipping loose. He hadn't told anyone, least of all Collins, but of course he had been terrified since she disappeared. He was convinced that every call they went out on, whether it concerned petty thievery or gang violence, would conclude with the discovery of her lifeless body. To find her alive, vivacious and grinning cheekily, was more than he could have hoped for, and he was momentarily overcome.

She looked--what was she wearing? Lace and fur and some sort of odd, shiny metallic trousers—she looked perfectly all right. Better than all right.

"Where have you been?" Jack asked, startled by the note of anger in his own tone. He recovered himself quickly, adding, "Miss Williams has been going out of her mind with worry."

"What? Why on earth should she?" Phryne said, affronted. "I left her a note."

Jack had seen this note when Miss Williams surrendered it to the City South Police Station, tearfully hanging off Collins' arm. Phryne had been missing less than a day, then, and he had told her not to worry so, that it was probably only her employer's idea of a joke.

That was six days ago, and in the meantime he had endured no less than two panicked visits from Dot alone, and a third where she accompanied Mrs Stanley and Phryne's pet red-raggers. He'd had to send them away with the official police line—the missing party had announced their departure in writing, and thus he could not open an official investigation until he had probable cause to worry for her safety.

Unofficially, he had been worried sick.

"Where have you been? What's happened to your hair?"

Her normally precisely trimmed locks now hung nearly to her shoulders, her fringe falling in careless waves over her eyes, which was not at all the fashion, not from what he'd seen of the ladies in town, but somehow on her—

"Never mind that," she said, grabbing his hand and pulling him around the box. "You must come with me."

They rounded it twice, and when they stopped he stumbled dizzily against the door, which Phryne rapped her knuckles against.

Jack was on the verge of protesting—really, what was happening?—when the door popped inward and a skinny man with an improbable nose emerged from the blue doors, and looked him up and down.

"Jack, I would like you to meet the Doctor."

"The Doctor?" he repeated.

"That's me," the young man said, glancing over him again. He turned to Phryne and said: "Are you sure? I don't like the look of him."

Jack looked back up the road, where Collins was no doubt mustering the courage to follow him. "Is this a joke? Where have you been?"

"Absolutely not," Phryne insisted. "I left that letter for Dot and told her I'd gone travelling, and I wouldn't be gone more than a week." Her brows drew together, and she clenched his wrist. "Jack, what day is it? How long have I been gone?

"Saturday—only six days," he found himself reassuring her. "Do you—Miss Fisher, have you been drinking?"

She scoffed.

"You think I've been on some kind of alcoholic bender?"

"Well, Collins dragged me out here to talk to a drunken farmer about a space ship, I'm honestly not sure what to think."

The Doctor scoffed. "Doesn't know what to think! Fishy, you can't be serious. At least bring me someone who knows how to think. Thinking is the most vital skill—"

Jack found himself saying, "Pardon me?", though what he meant was, "what in the hell are you on about?"

The Doctor said, "Thinking, it's a process where your brain forms ideas. Wait, no, I think the ideas form your brain. Oh, I don't know how it works with humans, but there are ideas, and brains, I know that much. I had a quite enlightening talk about this very subject with Leonardo da Vinci, once, he explained it much better than I could." The young man switched his attention abruptly to Phryne: "Would you like to meet him?"

"Perhaps later," Phryne said diplomatically, smiling too widely at Jack. "You did say it was guests' choice, after all, and I made mine. Isn't he wonderful?"

Jack had his doubts, but politely kept his mouth closed as he turned round to the examine the box. He could express his instant dislike when the other man was out of earshot.

The other man said, "He would have to be, the way you talk about him."

Jack swivelled around to see Phryne beaming at him, and holding this man, the Doctor, by one arm.

"Follow me Jack, you must come aboard."

"Now wait a moment—" the Doctor protested.

Phryne arched an eyebrow at him.

"Oh, fine. You can do the honours. Come along, soldier."

"Inspector," Jack corrected in time with Phryne.

The Doctor raised his hands in surrender. "As you say. Now, I think I spy some men with guns over on that hill, and if there's anything I don't like, it's men with guns."

Sure enough, Collins and the junior Constable were trudging down the hill in the distance, moving toward them. Not quite sprinting but walking briskly—ah, Collins had probably recognized Miss Fisher—well, they might as well get the explanation of her whereabouts all at once for the official record.

"Those are police," Phryne corrected gently, walking backwards to guide both Jack and the Doctor through the doors.

He got the sense this man, Doctor whoever-he-was, was used to being guided along by Phryne, who opened the doors to the police box, pulled him in by the hand, and Jack took a fleeting glance around and found he no longer had any words, and immediately thereafter lost the power to stand.

#

By the time he regained consciousness, he was propped in a chair facing a circular console in the middle of the room, some kind of command station, surrounded by tubes filled with soft glowing light, and bells and whistles, gleaming machinery he could not begin to categorize; and, to his left, Phryne Fisher, sprawled on an chaise with her silver heels kicked up on his chair, who was explaining that they were in a space ship and the guests of this doctor, who was a space alien.

"Did I faint just now?" Jack asked, trying to catch up.

"Yes, but I wasn't going to mention it. I have some tact after all."

The Doctor snorted and resumed fiddling with a lever and crank. The whole works wheezed a little, and the floor seemed to lurch under their feet.

Jack risked a glance up at the ceiling, trying to decide if this was real or--good lord, look at that. He had to ask: "Are we still in the Police Box?"

"Indeed we are," the Doctor answered, "and, d'you know, it's been ages since I've had an actual police person in here."

"It's more spacious that I would've expected." Jack stood up slowly, and batted away Phryne's steadying hands. "No, really, I'm fine, I've got to go out and meet Collins."

How long had he been passed out for? Surely only a moment.

"Hugh can wait five minutes," Phryne said, "we've so much catching up to do. It's been nearly six months from my side of things, and I've got so much to show you."

"Show me?"

She rolled her eyes. "We're in a time machine, Jack. Don't let me down now. We'll be back before you know it!"

 _Space ship_ was enough of a concept to struggle over; he was a long nap or a stiff drink away from contemplating _time machine._ "Hold on, where are we going?"

"Now that's the question," the Doctor said, but Phryne silenced him with a raised brow and hopeful expression.

"May I? Just this once?"

The Doctor flapped a hand, dismissive. "If you must."

Jack repeated. "Sorry, still quite confused. Where are we going?"

Phryne said, "Anywhere you want to go!" and threw open the outer doors.

The moon was much closer now, looking out the doors of the great blue box, but somehow the clear, delighted, smiling face before him was all Jack could focus on.


End file.
